Bilal Y. Saab is a senior fellow and director of the Defense and Security Program at the Middle East Institute. He is a political-military analyst on the Middle East and U.S. policy toward the region, focusing on security cooperation between the United States and its regional partners, and national security and defense processes in Arab partner countries. Previously, Saab served as a senior advisor for security cooperation in the Pentagon’s Office of the Secretary of Defense for Policy, with responsibilities for U.S. Central Command. He is a term member with the Council on Foreign Relations and a recipient of the International Affairs Fellowship. He is also an adjunct assistant professor at Georgetown University’s Security Studies Program. He has held fellowships and research and management positions at the Brookings Institution, Center for Strategic and International Studies, Middlebury Institute of International Studies’ James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies, and Atlantic Council.

Saab is published in peer-reviewed academic and policy journals, including The Washington Quarterly, Studies in Conflict and Terrorism, American Interest, and The National Interest, Foreign Affairs, and Foreign Policy. He frequently briefs and testifies before various agencies in the U.S. government and other governments around the world. He regularly provides commentary to international media outlets, including CNN, NPR, PBS Newshour, Reuters, The Washington Post, and The New York Times.